Bengaluru, January 18: We can expect a big change in WWE during the fall of 2019 as Smackdown Live is moving to FOX Sports from the USA Network in October. This is more of a mainstream kind of platform which offers a regular sports-based programmes to the audience. So the officials of FOX want to host Smackdown as part of a weekend sports block.

Hence, the so-called 'B-show’ of the WWE will move to Friday Nights instead of the current time slot on Tuesday night. The inside feeling is that FOX Sports will try to elevate Smackdown’s level to that of Monday Night Raw as they feel giving a tough competition to the flagship show will actually be good for WWE on the whole.

Healthy competition always helps to come up with good products. But they can’t do it without the star power needed on the blue brand. WWE Raw always possess a star-studded roster in comparison to that of Smackdown. So the backstage feeling is that FOX would demand big names to the Blue brand from Monday night's show. We already reported that Ronda Rousey is the name that has been considered to make the move to the blue brand in 2019.

Furthermore, the speculations are going on that WWE might decide to merge the roster instead of importing some names to Smackdown Live. This will help them to give equal opportunities to both the brands. But Wrestling Observer Newsletter suggests that this is not how FOX wants to utilize the WWE roster. They don’t want to 'cross-promote the same Superstars that are seen on NBC Universal’s USA Network’.

So the brand split will not come to an end soon. But there will be changes in how WWE conducts the live events. They will be using different crew members for Raw and Smackdown, as per the source, (courtesy 24wrestling.com)

“They will have separate production teams for RAW and SmackDown, and they will start doing more live events for the WWE Network. Early word is that the blue brand will do the live Friday SmackDown shows and whatever Saturday live events that will end up airing on the WWE Network. The red brand team will work on Sundays, for pay-per-view events or Sunday live events, along with RAW on Monday.”



Smackdown Live itself might go through a change, concept-wise alongside these changes. As reported earlier, there will be less comical stuff on the show in order to make it more sports-oriented. FOX Sports will also air multiple WWE shows apart from the Friday Night program. These are also going to be some original PPV or documentaries exclusive to the FOX network.